


Don't look back

by UpInOrbit



Category: Monsta X (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Post-Apocalypse, Angst, Drinking, M/M, Mentions of Death, Mentions of Violence, Talking about God, Zombies, it's honestly not that bad, see more in notes, survivor's guilt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-19
Updated: 2019-07-19
Packaged: 2020-07-08 19:35:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,667
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19874941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UpInOrbit/pseuds/UpInOrbit
Summary: The world had burned the first days.At first, they had tried to bury the bodies: long, endless rows of tombs, extending as far as the eye could reach. They had given up on them on the third day. There were too many, and soon they found out what was dead didn’t always stay like that, the soil over them merely an inconvenience as they rose.And so, the world had burned.The horizon had turned red and orange, flames licking the sky as the rest slowly turned grey, ashes coating everything. Soon, the fire was the only colour that broke through the monotony of the grey.Even then, five years later, the world was still painted with ash.Or a Showki post-apocalyptic fic





	Don't look back

**Author's Note:**

> Honestly, I don't know what I've done here, but I hope you like it! It's not as bad as I made it sound, but I wanted to make sure you all know what you're getting into. Kihyun suffers from survivor's guilt, I guess, after all that had happened, and he's not in the best place right now. There's nothing extremely graphic but there *are* zombies, so expect some fighting and death and it's a postapo so there *will* be some angst.  
> The title is taken from All time low's Old Scars/Future hearts  
> Big thanks to [Hagu](https://twitter.com/kihyeonssi) for giving me the pairing and [prompt](https://twitter.com/monstaruniverse/status/1124399534409494529), this wouldn't be here without you <33

The world had burned the first days. 

At first, they had tried to bury the bodies: long, endless rows of tombs, extending as far as the eye could reach. They had given up on them on the third day. There were too many, and soon they found out what was dead didn’t always stay like that, the soil over them merely an inconvenience as they rose.

And so, the world had burned.

The horizon had turned red and orange, flames licking the sky as the rest slowly turned grey, ashes coating everything. Soon, the fire was the only colour that broke through the monotony of the grey.

Even then, five years later, the world was still painted with ash.

***

Kihyun had grown to think there were very few things in the world that were absolute. Everything had a hidden side to them, an exception. Not death, though. Death was absolute, in all it’s horrifying glory. What died, stayed dead, bodies rotting to return to the ground they had come from.

When the world burned, even that had changed, the endless bodies littering the floor proof of it.

People died: peaceful deaths, brutal deaths, silent deaths. That wasn’t the problem. The problem came as they rose. 

When they rose, they were different. Warped, twisted, evil. Only a severed head or a bullet through their brain would stop them. Fire was also a good remedy as it burned away the remains, the empty shell that looked human but only craved destruction, death.

Kihyun was glad his house had burned. He didn’t think he’d be able to put Shownu to the ground if he had risen. Instead, he feared he would have welcomed his embrace.

***

Kihyun had found Wonho first. Or rather, Wonho had found Kihyun. Lost, bloodied, slightly unhinged. He had nursed Kihyun back to health, had been his rock as he took in the changed world. Wonho had been the one good thing in Kihyun’s life, the one that made him think the world could still be fixed, no matter how fucked up it had turned out to be.

It had been an unlikely pairing, but all rules, all that was valid before, had crumbled to dust when the world was set in flames. 

Together they had stood, fought, killed.

It had been just them for a long time.

***

“We need to move,” Kihyun’s words were met with groans and frowns from all the other three men. It wasn’t the first time they had discussed it, but it was important. “We are running out of food and we’ve been here for too long, it’s not safe anymore. It’s time we leave this place.”

“And go where?” Hyungwon sneered, taking a long sip from the bottle he was holding. The taste of the cheap alcohol made him grimace, but it was all they had. One couldn’t afford the luxury of being picky when everything else was gone. At least, they still had alcohol. “We’re running in fucking circles, Kihyun. I doubt things have been magically restored since we left.”

“We can go somewhere new,” he insisted. Hyungwon huffed.

“Go _where_?”

Kihyun opened his mouth to reply, but Minhyuk was faster. “The border,” he replied, alcohol slurring his words together. All eyes turned to him, and Kihyun groaned.

“There’s no point in going to the border, Minhyuk,” he enunciated his words clearly, slowly, as if talking to a stubborn child. Minhyuk’s eyes shone through the alcohol-induced haze.

“You heard it as much as I did, Kihyun! There’s more than this, there are places that weren’t affected! If we get to the border—”

“If we get to the border, then we _die_! You can’t believe the words of a drunk lunatic you just met!” Kihyun almost screamed, barely managing to keep the anger in check. Wonho grimaced and Hyungwon took another sip from the bottle. Minhyuk recoiled, almost like he had been hit, but he recovered and stood up, snarling.

“If we stay, we die anyway, Kihyun,” Minhyuk said, walking towards him. The fire played with his features, covering half his face in shadows. He looked like a ghost, but that was not how the dead came back to haunt the living, not anymore. “There’s nothing to lose if we try,” he pleaded.

Kihyun looked at his companions, exhaustion evident in their faces. Wonho’s eyes shone, expectant. Minhyuk was tired, but full of fire. Hyungwon was Kihyun’s mirror, knowing as well as he did they would find nothing in the border, just more death and barren fields. 

Hyungwon shrugged his shoulders, chucked down the rest of the bottle. Kihyun’s fingers itched for his gun.

“The border it is, then,” he whispered, ignoring the happy smile on Minhyuk’s face.

Everyone needed hope, he guessed. Even if it turned out to be the last nail in their coffins.

***

If Kihyun had found Wonho, or rather, Wonho had found Kihyun, then with Minhyuk and Hyungwon, they had stumbled upon them, sheer luck the only thing that made sure their paths would cross. 

Hyungwon had been tired, so tired. There had been a wound in his leg, one that was surely going to kill him, blood oozing through the poorly done stitching. Minhyuk had been clinging to his body, thrown over it as a human shield, his gun pointed in Kihyun and Wonho’s general direction.

Kihyun had taken one look at them and decided they were as good as dead.

Wonho had taken one look at them and decided they needed to be helped.

Kihyun had downright refused, unwilling to share their resources with two living corpses. What use would it be to give them what they had, if they were going to die soon, he asked. 

You were dying too when I found you, Wonho had argued, the softly spoken words enough to shut Kihyun up. 

Wordlessly, he had given Wonho what he needed, and helped him stitch Hyungwon back together.

Ever since then, it had been the four of them against the world.

***

Kihyun didn’t think there would ever be a day in which he wouldn’t wake up, drenched in sweat, his dreams filled with images of that dreadful day. It was something that would accompany him for ever, no matter where he went. It was imprinted in his brain, lurking in his mind, waiting for the moment he was too weak, too distracted, to fight, push it away.

Still, even with all the horrible things that had happened that day, and the many more that were yet to come, nothing could ever top the moment in which he had run to his house, only to find it completely destroyed. There was little left of it, only the charred remains of his dreams, his past, his present, his future. Laying somewhere among the ashes, were the broken remains of his heart.

Kihyun barely remembered anything from that evening, just falling down to his knees, tears he didn’t remember shedding streaming down his face. There was only static in his head, in his heart. To that day, he still couldn’t come up with a word that could describe the utter nothingness he had felt. Sadness seemed like a too weak word to describe it. It was more like desperation, one so deep it didn’t allow space for nothing else, so vast it took up everything that he was. It was bottomless, so numbing he couldn’t feel anything, not even despair, as if his insides were void of everything he should be feeling.

That day, it had been the end, for many. Unfortunately for the survivors, it had been the start for others too.

***

They said it was God's punishment. They said humans had angered God when they had played with science, toyed with things that were beyond their comprehension, and so God had become angry at them. He had lashed out at humanity, and that was their punishment. They had tried to live forever, and now they couldn't die.

It was all bullshit, if you were to ask Kihyun, but nobody asked him anything as he walked through the streets, empty where once they had been brimming with life. No one asked him anything as he walked past clusters of people praying, ripping at their clothes, begging for mercy.

Kihyun didn't believe in God, never had. He had tried once, as a kid, but he was too much of a cynic, even then. He didn't see the point in starting to believe then. If God had punished them, it was too late. If it was humans who had brought this onto themselves, then nothing had changed.

He understood the need to believe, he did. He understood the need to think there was something beyond that, something good that would justify it.

He understood it, but he didn't bother with it, not when he knew nothing that might come after could ever make up for the things he'd done, seen. Not when it was already Hell.

***

"We'll stop here," Kihyun announced. It was a place as good as any other, which meant little these days, but at least they would have a roof over their heads. Maybe, if they were lucky, it wouldn't have been completely raided out of supplies. "We'll rest for the night and continue tomorrow."

"There's still enough light to carry on," Minhyuk protested, confusion etched on his face. "We could still walk for a while."

"We could, but we don't know if we'll find somewhere else to hide if we do," he replied. Minhyuk shrugged, and proceeded to leave his stuff on the floor, setting up the perimeter. Kihyun replied to Hyungwon's grateful nod with one of his own, as he let himself fall to the ground, curling into himself. He pretended he didn't see Wonho knowing smile.

They set up camp with the efficiency of those that had done it a thousand times before, capable of repeating the process even while blindfolded. Kihyun took note of the depleting resources. He'd have to talk to Wonho about those, the slow trek through the country consuming them faster than usual. There were still plenty, but they might have to stay a day or two more than planned, to make sure they wouldn't encounter any trouble. Kihyun had been there before. It wasn't pretty.

There was nothing to be done for the time being, however, and so, gun under his makeshift pillow, knife strapped to his leg, he let sleep claim him.

***

Kihyun had always been told he was a good actor. His biggest asset was his voice, true, but he was a good liar, and so, he was a good actor. After all, what was an actor, if not a liar, valued for the lies he could sell to an audience that knew who he truly was?

It had always been his specialty, coming up with carefully constructed stories and characters. He would wear their skin, pretend their fears and hopes and dreams were his. It was almost too easy for him to leave Kihyun behind, a discarded piece of clothing that he came back to often, an old coat that was too comfortable to be thrown away, but one that he wouldn’t hesitate to shed if necessary.

Kihyun had always been a good actor. 

When his house burned, he stood up and turned his back to it, leaving the burnt remains of his previous life there. 

It was time for a change. It was time to pretend he was something else other than a breathing, walking corpse. It was time to pretend he hadn’t died in that fire.

It was more difficult than it used to be, but Kihyun had always been a good actor.

***

The first day he had seen them rise, it had been raining. He remembered it because it hadn’t rained in so long. One would think that, with everything that was going on, rain would be the last thing they’d notice, but for some reason, it had become a hyper fixation. 

Maybe he had lost his mind. Maybe they all had.

When the first drop fell to the ground, Kihyun had looked at the sky, and smiled. There had been something comforting about the rain, something that made him think of the _before_ , rather than the _after_. Maybe that was why he allowed himself to get distracted.

Kihyun hadn’t _seen_ them, but he had seen the destruction they left behind, death and devastation and everything in between. He had learned to be careful, carry a gun at all times. Still, he had allowed himself a moment to rejoice, to hope. 

He should have known hope got you killed.

By the time he had noticed something was wrong, it had been too late. He had been too careless, too lost in his own fantasy to realize where he was.

Beneath his feet, the ground was moving.

It wasn’t much at first, faint enough that Kihyun could almost fool himself into thinking it was nothing but some kind of animal, hungry enough to come that close to the surface. That fantasy broke as soon as the hand appeared.

The nails were painted in a soft shade of pink, beautiful and delicate. They had once been looked after, but that was gone, instead being bloodied and broken. For some reason, that was the only think he could focus on. At least, until the stench hit him. 

It was piercing, strong enough to make him retch, his eyes watering. Kihyun wished he could run, but he was rooted to the ground, incapable of moving, helplessly watching as the woman slowly dragged herself out from her tomb.

Her movements were clumsy, uncoordinated, her gaze unfocused. She looked everywhere but saw nothing. Her legs were still trapped under the soil, as if the earth itself wanted to hold her back, pulling her into an embrace she couldn’t escape.

For a second, a tiny, wonderful second, Kihyun thought he might stand a chance. Then, she saw him, and everything turned red.

One moment, she was half buried in the soil. The next, she had thrown herself onto Kihyun, hands first, a void, empty look in her eyes. The force with which she moved threw them both to the ground, and Kihyun was unable to grab his gun, least her teeth ripped off his head. She was foaming at the mouth, the skin of her wrists soft, soggy, mushy enough that Kihyun’s fingers could have pierced through it if he had squeezed hard enough. 

Kihyun met death right then, with a dead woman on top of him, trying to rip him apart with her teeth.

His arms were trembling with the strain to keep her away, about to give up, and she seemed to pick up on that, doubling her efforts. Kihyun was sure he was about to die when her head exploded, covering him in red and grime.

Shocked, Kihyun could do nothing but stare as the body toppled over, burying him beneath it. Then, a feet kicked it away and a hand was extended to help him up. Despite the gun he was holding, his saviour smiled at him, his eyes shining kindly from underneath his soaked fringe.

“Hey, I’m Wonho.”

***

Shownu had been kind, smart, handsome, innocent. He had been his best friend, the love of his life. Some days, Kihyun would wake up and lay in bed, breathless as he stared at Shownu, still unable to believe he had managed to find someone quite like him.

Shownu had been the highlight of his day, his beacon in the night, the hope for something better. His love for him had burned bright, and he knew it had been mutual, had never once doubted it.

Kihyun had left him in a shallow grave, a picture of him that had survived the conflagration buried beneath the soil. He walked away, not once looking back. His tears left trails of fire as they rolled down his cheeks.

They had burned as much as their love once did.

***

Footsteps had woken him up. 

They had been faint, but Kihyun had always been a light sleeper, and that had only worsened over the last few years. He slept in short intervals, woke up at the slightest of sounds. It was the only way to survive.

Soundlessly, Kihyun got up, hid behind a column and waited. He used to be impatient but that, like many other things, was a thing of the past, of the _before_ , rather than the _after_.

It didn’t take long until he spotted them, two shadows gliding along the farthest wall. They were silent, and that made him relax. Only humans could be so quiet. Humans, he understood. Humans, he could deal with.

Kihyun waited until their backs were turned to him, rummaging through the bags as silently as they could. They were so focused on the task at hand, they didn’t realize Kihyun was moving until it was too late.

“Don’t move,” he said, his voice loud enough to startle Wonho, sleeping to his left.

One of the shadows was fast, fleeing as soon as he heard Kihyun’s voice but the other wasn’t as much, Kihyun grabbing it by the hem of the shirt, pulling it back. He forced it to turn around, and reveal its face.

Kihyun blinked. It was barely a kid, split brow and lips, his bravado barely covering his fear. His hands shook as he stared at the barrel of the gun. He reminded Kihyun of the days of the past, long buried and forgotten. It wasn’t a feeling he enjoyed.

“Kihyun…,” Wonho’s warning tone made Kihyun tear his eyes away from the kid, turn to look at the entrance, the two figures that walked towards them.

“Let him go.”

Kihyun’s hands went lax at the sound of the voice, the shirt slipping through his fingers like water. His blood went cold as he watched them approach. It was as if he was seeing it all from above, the inevitable approaching, a single moment suspended in time. 

It was too much. 

It wasn’t enough.

Both men stepped closer, Hyungwon and Minhyuk illuminating their faces. 

A shot echoed through the building, drawing all eyes to him, but Kihyun was too far gone to notice, his fingers coiled tightly around the trigger. 

Kihyun wished they had never gone for the border, wished he hadn’t woken up. He wished for something, a different decision, anything that would have kept him from staring at a ghost.

***

Shownu had never been a religious man. Even if he had been, he would have given up on praying a long time ago, for the gods had died the day the world went up in flames, taking half the population with it. 

And yet, he found himself falling down his knees, tears streaming down his face, knife and gun laying beside him, forgotten, prayers spilling from his lips as if he were a holy man. 

"I thought you were dead," he whispered, his eyes never leaving Kihyun's face, the same face he had never forgotten, not even after five years. 

***

Kihyun’s hands shook. 

They hadn’t shaken in so long, steady as he fought, killed, lit up the pyres. And still, they shook then like they had the very first day, when he had clawed at the ground with his fingers, stained his wet cheeks with soil as he wiped away the tears, then continued to dig until his fingers bled.

He didn’t realize he was moving until he heard the cries, the cocking of guns as he pressed the barrel of his against Shownu’s forehead. His grip of the gun was loose, the way he held it against Shownu almost gentle. 

Kihyun’s hands shook so much he wasn’t sure he would hit him if he were to pull the trigger.

They must have painted quite a picture, he distantly thought. Him, slim and short, his face and arms covered in scars, standing, pressing his gun against the other’s forehead. Kneeling before him, a giant, brought down with a single black pebble, eyes filled with adoration as tears fell from them, uncaring of the barrel pressed between his eyebrows.

Kihyun didn’t realize he was crying until he felt the tears rolling down his neck, splattering against Shownu’s face.

***

It was always supposed to be a turning point. That day, he was supposed to surprise Shownu when he came back early, take him out to his favourite place, get down on one knee.

He had dreamt so much of that day, could almost taste it, feel it. He had already known the answer he would get.

Instead, he was met with the taste of ashes, and a crater where his house used to be. There had been nothing left for him to go back to.

Kihyun had carried the ring on him at all times, scared that Shownu would find it before it was time, a velvet case to protect such a tiny thing, vessel to his hopes and dreams.

He had thrown the ring in the river, not waiting to see it fall. It had been one less burden to tie him down.

***

Slowly, Kihyun’s hand fell to his side, and his body with it, until he was kneeling in front of Shownu, his mirror, his opposite. He couldn’t take his eyes off his face, the one he had once been more familiar to him than his own.

They were so close, so impossibly close. One jump away from bridging the distance between them, but Kihyun couldn’t do it, couldn’t bring himself to take that final step.

He had been there, so many times. He had taken it so many times, only to wake up to a wretched world, the remains of the dream eluding him, evaporating as the Sun rose.

Eventually, he had stopped dreaming. It had been best that way.

***

Kihyun let the others speak. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to, but rather that he couldn’t. He had forgotten every single word at the sight of Shownu. He couldn’t keep his eyes away from him, drinking up every detail, every shadow, committing it to memory, comparing them with those he had once tried to forget.

His fingers still itched for his gun, his knife, anything to break the mirage.

He didn’t move until Wonho stood in front of him, a crease between his brows, worry clouding his eyes. Kihyun knew his smile was too wide, too strained to fool anyone. How could he, with his carefully constructed world crumbling around him?

Wonho slowly took him away, recounting the conversation. Kihyun let him. He tried to ignore the eyes boring into him, burning him. It wasn’t hard to do. He had spent five years trying to forget how they felt like, after all.

***

Changkyun reminded Kihyun of himself, the look in his eyes the twin to Kihyun’s. 

There was something sad about all of them, there had to, when they had lost so much, seen so much, but there was something else there, shadows covering a wretched self, curtains drawn to keep all looks out.

Kihyun had seen that expression so many times, reflected in his own eyes whenever he caught sight of them in a shattered piece of glass. There was only so much one could do to disguise it, after all.

It wasn’t the only thing he was familiar with. Maybe it was the way Jooheon spoke to Changkyun, soft and tender, or maybe the expression in Shownu’s face when he stared at the younger, that it made Kihyun yearn for something he hadn’t felt in years.

He forced himself to tear his eyes away, keep the burning behind his eyelids at bay. He had forced himself to stop the wishful thinking a lifetime ago. There was only so much of it a man could take before it broke him.

***

“I looked for you, you know?” There was no reproach in Shownu’s voice, just a quiet statement of the facts but still Kihyun felt it like a blade, slicing up his insides. “I did for many years, until I found them,” he had found something else to keep him going, Shownu didn’t said. 

He didn’t need to. Kihyun could hear it in his tone, woven into the spaces between his words.

“I didn’t,” the confession tasted acrid in his mouth, bitter, burning him in the way out.

“I know,” Shownu’s reply was soft, full of understanding. Kihyun wished it wasn’t, wished it didn’t hurt as much as it did. There were many things he wanted to say, fighting each other, but it wasn’t difficult to drown them all. He had come to excel at it, after all.

Someone called for Shownu and he got up, turning away from Kihyun as he did so.

“I’m not angry you did so, Ki. I know it was the only way,” Kihyun stiffened at the sound of his old nickname, so familiar yet foreign.

Shownu’s fingers brushed against Kihyun’s cheek, gently wiping away the trail of tears Kihyun didn’t know he was shedding.

As Shownu turned around to leave, Kihyun’s hand shot forward, curling around Shownu’s wrist. It was brief, Kihyun dropping his hand as if the contact burned him but it was enough, enough to make Shownu look at him, something vaguely hopeful in his eyes. Kihyun pretended he didn’t see it.

“Stay,” his voice was hoarse, his body trembling with the effort to stay where he, the flight or fight response so ingrained in his body it had become a second skin.

Shownu stayed, however, close enough to feel Kihyun’s heat, far enough to leave him the space he needed. They stayed where they were, silent, basking in each other’s presence. They were two pieces of the same puzzle, long-lost and found, battered and broken until they were barely recognizable but maybe, they could still fit. Not as they once had, but maybe they didn’t need to.

There was something vaguely hopeful in the space Kihyun’s heart used to take. He pretended he didn’t see it.

Silently, he wished.

***

Everyone had a story. Some wore them on their sleeves, gave them away like another might give smiles. Others, they kept them close, hidden inside so that no one would ever see them.

Everyone had a story. Their’s just happened to be bloodier, grimier, darker than usual.

There was much to fill as they walked to the border, years of stories untold, tales of people long since gone, but they spoke. The seven of them spoke, filling the gaps and the silence, pouring out their hearts if only to remind themselves they could.

They might never get to the border. They might get there to see nothing but death and barren fields, but still they walked, wishing for something, yearning for the possibility of a future. And for that, they’d at least try.

***

He had yearned for a forever, once. He had been so close he could almost touch, feel it’s comforting warmth. It had been ripped apart just in front of his eyes, taking vital pieces of him in the process.

He had wished for forever in a world that was simple enough, beautiful enough. He had found emptiness instead.

Kihyun had let the emptiness devour him until there had been nothing left but a husk, void of all things that had once been him, things that he had purposefully left behind.

It had been enough. It had been cold.

He had stopped wishing when he found it. Not forever, never forever, but absolution, a promise with gentle eyes and tender hands, words filled with love, sounds of a voice he had once adored but learnt to forget. 

An excuse, in the form of absolution. An excuse to fill an empty husk, fill it without regret that he lived.

There was no ring, that time. There might never be. But there was a promise, in Shownu’s and Kihyun’s intertwined hands, in the curve of their lips and hidden mirth in their eyes, in the bickering of those around them as they walked, and that, was enough.

**Author's Note:**

> Honestly, I was going to make the end a bit angstier, but I thought it was enough as it was. I hope you've enjoyed the story and please tell me what you've thought of it because this was my first attempt at something like this!  
> Comments and kudos warm my heart ^^
> 
> [tw](https://twitter.com/starryjinsouls) || [cc](https://curiouscat.me/Val_99)
> 
> \- Val


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